


pale king = white diamond, illuminati confirmed

by Schnikeys_Discuss (Schnikeys)



Series: Clockie's Meta [14]
Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Analysis, Archived from radioactivesupersonic Blog, Character Analysis, Gen, Nonfiction, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:54:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27057553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schnikeys/pseuds/Schnikeys_Discuss
Summary: "He strikes me as very similar to Steven Universe’s White Diamond- a radiant, deific ruler who will invade or overstep the autonomy of their subjects in pursuit of an idea of perfection, of purity, but also someone deeply absorbed in their own head who doesn’t exactly let themselves breathe under those unrelenting standards either."
Series: Clockie's Meta [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1974223
Kudos: 6





	pale king = white diamond, illuminati confirmed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ClockworkRainbow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkRainbow/gifts).



I have basically to my own surprise been building Pale King headcanons because I’ve been increasingly toying with the idea of a fic where he gets dragged back from the dead by newly-ascended Ghost.

Roughly, I feel like he’s a combination of obscenely overpowered, and simultaneously, _extremely bad_ at actually taking care of himself in the wilderness free-for-all the kingdom has become. Given the cut of his robes, he wasn’t exactly scrambling or climbing or moving in ways other than a Proper, Deliberate Walk or flying with his wings and one imagined the latter took place in fairly open and ordered environments. Ironically, for the person responsible for the worst platforming section in the game, he is probably pretty awful at platforming.

He strikes me as very similar to Steven Universe’s White Diamond- a radiant, deific ruler who will invade or overstep the autonomy of their subjects in pursuit of an idea of perfection, of purity, but also someone deeply absorbed in their own head who doesn’t exactly let _themselves_ breathe under those unrelenting standards either. After all, the King basically destroyed his relationship with his wife and the one child he grew close to and then basically withdrew into isolation to die. His memory of his attendants is them throwing themselves at his feet, neither looking at or speaking to him.

So I kind of figure depending on what angle a situation hits him at, he can conduct himself with a terrifying eldritch callousness- someone who looks down on you, but specifically in the way that a carpenter might look down on a block of wood- that a great deal of the qualities you have are negotiable relevant to what he _needs_ you to be.

And other times, he can just seem kind of harmless- like somehow centuries and millennia of existence have left him more out of touch than worldly. With his basic needs, with having a conversation, with the actual way that people live their life. His detachment is less an active scorn, and more, that, trying earnestly, there are things that brilliant mind of his can’t _get_ about people- himself, or others.

And neither’s fake and neither’s the whole picture, and this would just make interacting with him kind of a wild ride, because maybe he’s in a situation where he’s mostly out of his depth, and attempting to figure out what to do with himself, actually, when everything he built fell to ruin in such a way that there is not an obvious angle to repair it, when people are more likely to ignore or pity him, or find him slightly strange, than revere him, and being ‘that weirdo’ is a level of intimacy he’s totally unprepared for, and then after three hours of sort of sad sort of heartwarming sort of funny antics, he gets attacked by a lesser mawlek and just renders it into its component pieces very quickly and efficiently, and is now contemplating if he should build something out of those, or if he should go get more organs from something else first. This isn’t very much tissue to work with. He consults whoever’s been accompanying him for a second opinion and is surprised to find they’re horrified.

* * *

Tags: [#he's not cuddly and he's a mess in some ways that are sympathetic and some that are Really Not](https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/tagged/he%27s-not-cuddly-and-he%27s-a-mess-in-some-ways-that-are-sympathetic-and-some-that-are-Really-Not) [#and exploring the idea of that in terms of his power set](https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/tagged/and-exploring-the-idea-of-that-in-terms-of-his-power-set) [#in some ways he's obscenely squishy compared to Hornet or the Vessels](https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/tagged/in-some-ways-he%27s-obscenely-squishy-compared-to-Hornet-or-the-Vessels) [#in others he is the last person you want to fight ever because he doesn't really view it as fighting as much as informative vivisection](https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/tagged/in-others-he-is-the-last-person-you-want-to-fight-ever-because-he-doesn%27t-really-view-it-as-fighting-as-much-as-informative-vivisection)

**Author's Note:**

> Analysis originally found at: <https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/post/183430603470/i-have-basically-to-my-own-surprise-been-building>


End file.
